Windows 7 installation hanging..

at completion reboot stage.

I successfully set up a dual boot XP Pro / Windows 7 RC 7100 on my new PC.. (Gigabyte P45-UD3R, E6750, 4GB RAM) only after updating the BIOS.. but I wanted to re-install so I formatted both the C: (XP) and D: (W7) using Acronis Disk Director, re-installed XP with no problems, but when I try and install W7, either from DVD or USB flash it gets to the last reboot whilst completing insatallation then hangs at 'Verifying DMI Data'.

I tried again, re-installing XP and then deleting and re-creating an unformatted partition (D) for W7, but exactly the same thing happens.

I've removed either the DVD or USB flash drive on first re-boot and changed the BIOS boot sequence to HDD first , but still no luck.

Help please!! I'm going bald

I had a similar problem installing either 32 or 64 bit Windows 7. It would hang on the first re-boot of the install. Problem was traced to the boot sector. It had a previous Linux boot entry and Win 7 couldn't find the operating system to re-boot. Was on an Asus M3A78-CM motherboard that had ExpressGate installed previously.

Solution? Erase partition on that also contained the boot record and NOT format the partition before installing or simply zero the first sector to erase it.

apollo911 said:

at completion reboot stage.

I successfully set up a dual boot XP Pro / Windows 7 RC 7100 on my new PC.. (Gigabyte P45-UD3R, E6750, 4GB RAM) only after updating the BIOS.. but I wanted to re-install so I formatted both the C: (XP) and D: (W7) using Acronis Disk Director, re-installed XP with no problems, but when I try and install W7, either from DVD or USB flash it gets to the last reboot whilst completing insatallation then hangs at 'Verifying DMI Data'.

I tried again, re-installing XP and then deleting and re-creating an unformatted partition (D) for W7, but exactly the same thing happens.

I've removed either the DVD or USB flash drive on first re-boot and changed the BIOS boot sequence to HDD first , but still no luck.

Help please!! I'm going bald

nightmare.. I ended up doing a low-level format with the Samsung utility which completed with no errors and told me my disk was fine.. except it was completely unusable, sector 0 had become unreadable. I tried everything from killdisk to magic hdd , nothing would read it, except the bloody htutil samsung utility that destroyed it!

I replaced it to return to Samsung and started again..installed XP OK on C then started installing W7.. during first reboot it did a chkdsk and repaired the bitmap of the MFT.. then hung.

I ran ERD commander attached to the XP system, reran chkdsk which re-fixed the 'uppercase' file and I deleted the W7 partition.

Re-installed W7 and didn't allow it to run the chkdsk on re-boot - it installed OK BUT I then booted into XP which ran a chkdsk, fixed something - it was too quick to see - and then wouldn't reboot!!

I'm stuck again, Acronis doesn't see the drive.. I'm thinking it's the sector 0 problem again - I'm running out of hard disks ;-(

hmm...seems to be growing like topsy.

Windows 7 wants a clean install accoring to Microsoft. That could mean no boot record and dual boot on the primary boot drive.

If you have your files backed up. Why not delete your primary boot partition, install Win 7 there with no format and do a XP install on a spare partition to get the dual boot? I think there may be a problem with the boot editor after that though. I'm not sure Easy BCD will work in 7. You would have to do some information research first.

I installed W7 into unallocated space, rather than an unformatted partition..

and so far so good

..now i'm going to try installing 64-bit into a third partition ;-)

Well be careful. When I installed Win 7 64 bit, it created a whole new boot partiton. The boot partition was only 100 MB. 7 seemed harder than to install than the 32 bit version. One good thing was it installed all the drivers properly, right from the basic getgo. Did you try the Technet forum at Windows 7 Category for info?